Plan prices were read on Hosting.com’s own pages on September 24, 2026. The Black Friday price was read on November 2, 2026.
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A2 Hosting is now Hosting.com, owned by the former World Host Group, not Newfold. Our verdict: a solid LiteSpeed shared host with 24/7 phone support and a 30-day refund, but watch the renewal. The $1.99 Starter price needs a four-year prepay, then renews at $13.99 a month, 7.03 times the intro rate. We have not run a hands-on test since the rebrand.
Verdict
| Verdict | Good for small sites that want fast shared hosting and a phone number to call. Budget for the renewal price, not the headline. |
| Score | Not scored yet. WTH has not run a hands-on test since the rebrand. |
| Best for | Small businesses that want LiteSpeed shared hosting with phone support |
| Not for | Anyone who wants the lowest possible monthly bill without prepaying for years |
| Biggest catch | Starter renews at $13.99 a month, 7.03 times the $1.99 four-year rate |
| Owner | Hosting.com (formerly World Host Group), backed by Oakley Capital |
| Refund window | 30 days on shared, WordPress and reseller hosting; VPS and dedicated excluded |
Show me today’s Hosting.com plans and renewal prices
Hosting.com prices and renewal prices
Black Friday 2026: Hosting.com’s Starter plan is $1.49 a month for 12 months ($17.88 upfront), renewing at $13.99 a month. Order by November 30 (its promotion terms; the sale page says December 14). See our Hosting.com Black Friday page. Prices read November 2, 2026.
| Plan | First-term price | Term you must prepay | Renews at | Renewal Multiple | Price read |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shared Starter | $1.99/mo | 48 months ($95.49 upfront) | $13.99/mo | 7.03x | Sep 24, 2026 |
| Shared Starter | $2.99/mo | 12 months | $13.99/mo | 4.68x | Sep 24, 2026 |
| Shared Pro | $3.79/mo | 48 months | $19.99/mo | 5.27x | Sep 24, 2026 |
| Shared Pro | $4.99/mo | 12 months | $19.99/mo | 4.01x | Sep 24, 2026 |
| Shared Max | $7.79/mo | 48 months | $27.99/mo | 3.59x | Sep 24, 2026 |
| Shared Max | $9.49/mo | 12 months | $27.99/mo | 2.95x | Sep 24, 2026 |
| Managed WordPress (WP Small) | $3.49/mo | 36 months | $9.99/mo | 2.86x | Sep 24, 2026 |
| Unmanaged VPS (4 GB) | $6.49/mo | 36 months | $19/mo | 2.93x | Sep 24, 2026 |
The Renewal Multiple is the renews-at price divided by the first-term price, for the same plan and term. It is the metric behind our Hosting Renewal Price Index. “Renews at” is Hosting.com’s regular monthly price: its renewal policy page says prepaid plans renew at regular pricing once the term ends. Prices come from the store data each Hosting.com page loads. Promo prices move often, so treat the live checkout page as the final word.
Key takeaways
- New name, new owner. World Host Group announced the A2 Hosting deal on January 29, 2025. The company blog announced the Hosting.com name on April 28, 2025, and the rebrand was reported complete by May 2.
- Not Newfold. Our old page said A2 belonged to Endurance (now Newfold Digital). That was wrong. Newfold owns Bluehost and HostGator, not this company.
- Three shared plans: Starter (5 sites), Pro (10 sites) and Max (50 sites), per Hosting.com’s plans page on November 2, 2026.
- Check the term behind the $1.99 headline. It needs a four-year prepay. A one-year term is $2.99 a month, and month-to-month is $13.99.
- Refunds: 30 days on shared, WordPress and reseller hosting. VPS plans, dedicated servers, domains and SSL certificates are not covered.
What happened to A2 Hosting?
Short version: a private-equity-backed hosting roll-up bought it, then used it as the flagship for a single global brand.
| Date | What happened | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 2001 | A2 Hosting founded in Ann Arbor, Michigan | Hosting.com blog |
| April 2019 | A2 disables all its Windows shared and VPS services after a security breach, a multi-day outage | The Register |
| 2024 | Oakley Capital merges its Webcentral business with World Host Group (WHG) | Oakley Capital |
| January 29, 2025 | WHG announces it has acquired A2 Hosting | PR Newswire |
| April 28, 2025 | A2 Hosting announces the Hosting.com name on its blog (reported official May 2; PR Newswire release May 7) | Hosting.com blog, webhosting.today, PR Newswire |
| 2025 | WHG itself rebrands to Hosting.com and starts folding other brands into it | Oakley Capital |
| August 26, 2025 | Rocket.net joins Hosting.com; its platform powers Hosting.com’s managed WordPress plans | PR Newswire, Hosting.com |
So who owns it? Hosting.com says it is owned and run by its founders and management team, with a parent company in Luxembourg. Its outside investors include Oakley Capital, a private-equity firm, and its lenders are Barings and Bain Capital. If you were an A2 customer, your account moved to Hosting.com. Other small hosts WHG bought are going the same way. CoolHandle is one, which is why our CoolHandle page now points here.
My read, based on the documents rather than a test: the product looks like A2’s old Turbo stack with a bigger company behind it. The price structure is the thing to watch.
How much does Hosting.com really cost after the first term?
Hosting.com’s renewal policy page says monthly plans, and prepaid plans once the term ends, renew at regular pricing. On Starter, that is the jump from $1.99 or $2.99 to $13.99 a month. Look for the renewal line before you pay, not after.
Managed VPS (cPanel) is not in the table because we did not read a price for it. Hosting.com runs patching and security on it, and you get no root access.
Show me the renewal price for the plan I want
Are the Turbo plans still around?
Not by name. The old A2 names (Startup, Drive, Turbo Boost, Turbo Max) are gone, and the old Turbo hosting URL now redirects to the main plans page. Hosting.com maps Startup to Starter, Turbo Boost to Pro and Turbo Max to Max.
Here is what the plans page sells today (read November 2, 2026):
| Plan | Websites | NVMe storage | Extras over the plan below |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | 5 | 15 GB | Daily backups, free SSL, malware detection |
| Pro | 10 | 50 GB | More CPU and RAM, staging sites |
| Max | 50 | 100 GB | Highest CPU and RAM, SLA, priority support |
Ignore Hosting.com’s older A2 comparison page if you land on it. It still lists a Plus plan and different site limits and prices, none of which the plans page offers.
Compare Hosting.com’s Starter, Pro and Max plans
What we checked (and what we did not)
We did not buy an account or run speed tests for this update. Here is what we did on September 24, 2026:
- Read the acquisition and rebrand press releases.
- Loaded Hosting.com’s plan, VPS, WordPress, renewal-pricing, refund and ownership pages directly, including the store prices each page loads.
- Checked the investor record on Oakley Capital’s portfolio page.
Pros and cons
Pros
- LiteSpeed web server, NVMe SSD storage and AMD EPYC CPUs are standard on every shared plan.
- Phone support, which many budget hosts have dropped.
- A 30-day money-back guarantee on shared, WordPress and reseller hosting, including multi-year prepays.
- Managed WordPress now runs on Rocket.net’s platform, with WP Rocket and Object Cache Pro included.
- Four legacy A2 server locations for shared and reseller hosting: Arizona, Michigan, Amsterdam and Singapore.
Cons
- The cheapest advertised price needs a four-year commitment.
- VPS plans and dedicated servers are not covered by the money-back guarantee.
- Managed VPS gives you no root access. You need an unmanaged server for that.
- The company is mid-consolidation. More brands are moving onto the same platform, and that can mean support queues and panel changes for a while.
Performance: what is under the hood?
No speed numbers here, because we have not tested since the rebrand. What the spec sheet says:
- Server stack: LiteSpeed, NVMe SSDs, AMD EPYC processors on shared hosting.
- Data centers: Arizona and Michigan (US), Amsterdam (Netherlands) and Singapore for legacy A2 shared and reseller servers, per Hosting.com’s knowledgebase. Managed WordPress added locations in 2025, including Toronto, Dubai and India. On August 13, 2026 a cooling failure at a Phoenix data center left Hosting.com’s Phoenix servers unavailable for a time; how long is not in the public record we found.
- WordPress caching: full-page caching plus WP Rocket and Object Cache Pro on the managed WordPress plans.
If raw speed is the reason you are shopping, also look at our best cloud hosting picks. Cloud plans give you dedicated resources rather than a shared server.
Support: can you actually reach a person?
Yes, by three routes. Hosting.com lists 24/7/365 support by live chat, phone (+1 734-222-4678) and tickets. The company says it handles about 150,000 inquiries a month. That is its own figure, not ours.
Support quality is the main reason people pick a host like this. For more options, see our list of hosts for site owners who want great support.
Security
Hosting.com’s plans page lists free SSL, a web application firewall, malware detection and removal, and daily backups with restore to any point in the last 30 days. On managed VPS, Hosting.com’s team handles OS patching, firewall upkeep and security updates. Unmanaged VPS puts that job on you.
Who should pick an alternative?
- You want month-to-month billing at a low price. Starter costs $13.99 billed monthly. Compare Namecheap’s hosting first.
- You need a refund option on a VPS. Hosting.com’s guarantee excludes VPS plans. Look at our cheap VPS hosting list for alternatives.
- You run a high-traffic WordPress business and want a specialist with a long track record at that level. Read our WP Engine review.
Show me Hosting.com’s WordPress plans
Methodology
This is a document review, not a hands-on test. On September 24, 2026 we read the acquisition and rebrand press releases, Hosting.com’s own plan, pricing, refund, ownership and support pages, and Oakley Capital’s portfolio page. Every number above maps to an entry in this page’s sources block. We will add a score after we run our own test account.
FAQ
Is A2 Hosting still in business?
Yes, under a new name. A2 Hosting became Hosting.com in April 2025 after World Host Group bought it in January 2025. Existing accounts moved to Hosting.com.
Who owns Hosting.com?
Hosting.com is the brand of the company formerly called World Host Group. It says it is run by its founders and management, with Oakley Capital as an outside investor and a parent company in Luxembourg. It is not owned by Newfold Digital, the parent of Bluehost and HostGator.
Does Hosting.com have a money-back guarantee?
Yes. Shared, WordPress, email and reseller hosting have a 30-day money-back guarantee, even on multi-year plans. Domains, VPS plans, dedicated servers, SSL certificates and third-party products such as Microsoft 365 are excluded.
Where are Hosting.com’s data centers?
Legacy A2 shared and reseller servers run from Arizona, Michigan, Amsterdam and Singapore. Managed WordPress added more locations in 2025, including Toronto, Dubai and India.
Is Hosting.com cheaper than A2 Hosting was?
The entry price looks similar, but check the term. The $1.99 Starter rate needs a four-year prepay, one year costs $2.99 a month, and month-to-month is $13.99. Check the renewal line on each plan before you buy.
Sources
Full source list with retrieved dates is in this page’s sources block.
Update log
- : Published the full rewrite: A2 Hosting is now Hosting.com, owned by World Host Group. Added the Black Friday 2026 price. Later the same day: cut outdated history and re-checked the price citations against the hosts\’ own pages.
- : Read every plan price, renewal rate and refund term on Hosting.com’s own pages.
